1. Field
Apparatuses and methods consistent with exemplary embodiments relate to estimating a position of a moving vehicle such as a mobile robot.
2. Description of the Related Art
Robots originally refer to automatic dolls having hands and other parts operating like a human and also having a human shape made by assembling mechanical apparatuses therein. Recently, the word “robot” signifies any automated equipment performing a job by itself regardless of its shape. In particular, mobile robots are widely adopted because they can perform an operation on behalf of a human under an extreme environment or in a dangerous place. Also, home mobile robots, such as cleaning robots, for helping housework while moving around in a house by itself, have been widely distributed.
In order for a robot to automatically perform various jobs, the robot is capable of moving by itself. To address a robot's self moving matter, localization for recognizing its own position is essential for performing a job by itself while moving around. One of localization technologies is a simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM). The SLAM of a robot is a method of detecting surrounding environment information, processing obtained information, making a map corresponding to a space for performing a job, and tracking its own absolute position.
Various sensors such as a global positioning system (GPS), light detection and ranging (LIDAR), or a camera have been conventionally used with odometry to estimate the position of a robot. However, the GPS is often erroneous and works properly only in an outdoor environment. The LIDAR is known to be accurate but easily fails to track the position of a robot due to non-reflection of light when used outdoors.